A WASHINGTON-based think tank has warned that the NATO military alliance and the United States are ‘creeping closer to the catastrophic scenario’ in Ukraine, threatening a direct war between Moscow and Washington.
In an article published on Responsible Statecraft on Monday, Branko Marcetic said the US and the military alliance ‘have serially blown past their own self-imposed lines over arms transfers’, referring to the US advanced rocket systems sent to Ukraine.
‘NATO arms transfers have now escalated well beyond what governments had worried just months ago could draw the alliance into direct war with Russia, with the US and European governments now sending armoured vehicles and reportedly preparing to send tanks,’ the article reads.
The article noted that despite stressing at the start of the war last year that US forces ‘are not and will not be engaged in the conflict,’ a larger presence of both CIA and US special operations personnel has been reported in Ukraine, conducting ‘clandestine American operations’ in the country.
Among those ‘clandestine operations’, the article cited investigative journalist and former Green Beret Jack Murphy reporting on Dec. 24 about CIA’s work with an ‘unnamed NATO ally’s spy agency to carry out sabotage operations within Russia.’
‘This is the kind of activity that skirts dangerously close to direct NATO-Russia confrontation,’ notes the article, pointing to the NATO adventurism in Ukraine.
As the US crosses its declared red lines concerning military aid to Ukraine, the writer of the article wondered how long the US opposition to sending long-range drones, tanks and long-range missiles called ATACMS and F-16 fighter jets will last.
A bipartisan group of US senators is currently pushing for supplying Ukraine with long-range drones, even though Moscow has explicitly warned the move would make Washington ‘a direct party to the conflict.’
‘By escalating their support for Ukraine’s military, the US and NATO have created an incentive structure for Moscow to take a drastic, aggressive step to show the seriousness of its own red lines,’ the article stated.
‘When we speak about what is happening in Ukraine – it is a war, not a hybrid one, almost a real war,’ the Russian foreign minister said.
‘Little by little, NATO and the United States are creeping closer to the catastrophic scenario President Joe Biden said “we must strive to prevent” – direct conflict between the United States and Russia,’ Marcetic wrote.
‘As the Ukraine war effort has stalled and Russian forces have made small advances, NATO arms transfers have now escalated well beyond what governments had worried just months ago could draw the alliance into direct war with Russia, with the US and European governments now sending armoured vehicles and reportedly preparing to send tanks. Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksii Reznikov had predicted as much in October last year.’
According to the article, the US ‘often finds it hard to get itself out’ of military conflicts that it involves itself in, referring to its military invasion of Afghanistan that morphed into a nearly two-decade-long futile military adventure.
‘And it could be happening right now in Ukraine,’ the article states, warning of another Afghanistan-like disaster.
Moscow launched the military operation in February last year, claiming to defend the pro-Russian population in the eastern Ukrainian regions of Lugansk and Donetsk against persecution by Kiev, and also to ‘de-Nazify’ its neighbour.
Over the past year, the US and its NATO allies have supplied a large cache of advanced military equipment to Ukraine, despite Moscow’s repeated warnings.
- Senior US officials said that the several thousand US troops currently stationed in Romania near the Ukraine border will remain there for at least nine more months, according to a New York Times report.
US officials said on Saturday that there are about 4,000 American soldiers with the 101st Airborne Division who have been deployed at the sprawling Mihail Kogalniceanu Air Base since last summer, including small groups of troops that frequently train right on Romania’s border with Ukraine, the Times reported.
Over the last year, the airbase has become a training hub for NATO forces in southeast Europe. The forces would be a first line of defence should Russia invade further west, according to the report.
Officials said America’s 101st Airborne Division troops will leave in the next two months, but they would be replaced by a different brigade from the 101st Division.
They added that the mission will be led by the senior staff, including its two-star general and top planners, and the deployment is expected to be a nine-month-long.
Military analysts have said the mission led by the senior staff would allow for quick decisions about where to position troops and weapons should Russia push the war into NATO territory.
The move ‘would ensure the United States continues to be well positioned to provide a robust deterrent and defensive posture alongside our allies across the European continent,’ the US Army said in a statement on Saturday. ‘The United States will continue to adjust its posture as needed in response to the dynamic security environment.’
‘I am waiting for the inevitable, reciprocal move by Russia – troop placement at the US border. China could also decide to join the party,’ said New York-based journalist Don DeBar.
‘Cuba is one obvious possible host. Venezuela and Nicaragua are others. Even Mexico, under President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, and perhaps Brazil could become stations for Russian and/or Chinese military assets. Is this really where we should be heading? Where can it lead?’ he asked.
The Biden administration has been increasing the deployment of American forces in Europe at Russia’s doorstep since the country launched a military operation in neighbouring Ukraine. The deployment also included about 12,000 American troops, currently based in western Poland, to work with NATO forces in Poland and the Baltic states.
Washington has also supplied weapons worth billions of dollars to Ukraine and trained its forces to fight against Russia.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has said the US is directly involved in the Ukraine war by supplying the country with weapons and training its soldiers.
‘You shouldn’t say that the US and NATO aren’t taking part in this war. You are directly participating in it,’ Lavrov said last month. ‘And not just by providing weapons but also by training personnel. You are training their military on your territory, on the territories of Britain, Germany, Italy and other countries.’
Lavrov said the US and its NATO allies are trampling on international law while trying to isolate and destroy Russia.
- The US defence industry is ‘unprepared’ for a ‘protracted conventional war’ with arch-foe China over Taiwan, according to a new study by a US-based think tank published Monday.
The Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) carried out a war games simulation that showed the US would be depleted of its munitions, including long-range, precision-guided ones, in less than a week of war with China in the Taiwan Strait.
‘The US defence industrial base is not adequately prepared for the competitive security environment that now exists. It is currently operating at a tempo better suited to a peacetime environment,’ the think tank said in the report.
According to the report, the US military aid to Ukraine has depleted the arms stockpiles of the US Department of Defence and points to the difficulties the US industrial base could face in supplying munitions for a major war.
It said the number of Javelin systems sent to Ukraine is equal to the total number built for non-US customers over the last 20 years, pointing to the incapacity of the country’s defence industry to supply enough weapons for long-term conflicts.
‘The main problem is that the US defence industrial base — including the munitions industrial base — is not currently equipped to support a protracted conventional war,’ the study stated.
‘In a major regional conflict, such as a war with China in the Taiwan Strait, the US use of munitions would likely exceed the current stockpiles of the US Department of Defence (DoD), leading to a problem of “empty bins’’.’
Sustaining a long-term war conflict would be ‘difficult,’ it noted, especially as China is ‘investing in munitions and other weapons systems five to six times faster than the US’.
The study, which considered inputs from top military, defence, and congressional officials, as well as industry leaders, revealed that the US has been slow to replenish its military arsenal.
‘The history of industrial mobilisation suggests that it will take years for the defence industrial base to produce and deliver sufficient quantities of critical weapons systems and munitions and recapitalise stocks that have been used up,’ it stated.
The United States has announced a whopping new package of arms and munitions for Ukraine worth $2.5 billion, defying Moscow’s repeated warnings against supplying Kiev with heavy weaponry almost a year into the devastating war.
‘How do you effectively deter if you don’t have sufficient stockpiles of the kinds of munitions you’re going to need for a China-Taiwan Strait kind of scenario,’ Seth Jones, a senior vice president at the CSIS, was quoted as telling The Wall Street Journal.
‘The bottom line is the defence industrial base, in my judgment, is not prepared for the security environment that now exists,’ Jones added.
The study blamed outdated military contracting procedures and slow-moving bureaucracy for the problems facing the US weapons industry.
‘These shortfalls would make it extremely difficult for the United States to sustain a protracted conflict,’ the report said. ‘They also highlight that the US defence industrial base lacks adequate surge capacity for a major war.’
Washington is Taiwan’s most important international backer and arms supplier, despite the absence of formal diplomatic relations.
US arms sales to Taiwan are a constant irritant in Beijing’s relations with Washington, which have rapidly deteriorated in recent years.
China has sovereignty over Chinese Taipei, and under the ‘One China’ policy, almost all world countries recognise that sovereignty, meaning they would not establish direct diplomatic contact with the self-proclaimed government in Taipei.
